Carle is a wonderful driving instructor! He’s taught 3 of my children so far, and I hope he’s still giving lessons when the rest of my kids are ready. I felt safer knowing my teenagers were driving with him!
How It Works
Steps to Get an Idaho Learner’s Permit
(officially called a Driver Training Permit)
1. Sign up for an Idaho-approved driving school.
2. Make an appointment with the Kootenai County Driver’s License Office: Driver’s License | Kootenai County Sheriff, ID
At your appointment, you will need to ask for a Driver Training Permit for your teen. Your teen must be at least 14 years and 6 months old. You will need the following documents:
a. your teen’s birth certificate
b. your own photo ID
c. a document that shows that you and your teen are Idaho residents (such as a school enrollment record, a lease, a utility bill, or an employment record)
d. your teen’s Social Security card
e. Verification of School Compliance (a letter from your school office; if you are homeschooling, you can sign an affidavit for your teen to satisfy this requirement)
At your appointment, they will ask you what driving school to send the permit to. Tell them Crusader Driving School in Post Falls. Save the photocopy of the permit they give you.
3. Reply to the welcome email you received from Crusader Driving School when you signed up, and include a scan or picture of the permit. Crusader Driving School partners with Brian Johns of Idaho Online Driver Education. Once you have completed your signup with us, he will email you a link to begin the required online course.
4. Your teen must complete all lessons of the online course and pass the final exam. You will receive an email when your teen has passed the course.
5. Once you have received the email confirming that your teen has passed the online course, call us to schedule the required in-car portion of the instruction. Your teen must go through 4 lessons of 1 ½ hours each with our licensed instructor.
6. Once your teen has successfully completed the in-car lessons, the instructor will hand over your teen’s permit to you.
From Learner’s Permit to Driver’s License
The main goals of the teen course offered by Crusader Driving School are to meet the State of Idaho requirements and to give teens the basic preparation they need to be able to drive with their parents. Most teens are not skillful enough to drive on their own after completing our course, and the State of Idaho also has additional legal requirements that teens must meet before they can drive without adult supervision.
Once a teen has a Driver Training Permit, but before they can take the road skills test & written test to get their driver’s license, Idaho law requires them to complete 50 more hours of supervised driving, and 10 of those hours must be after dark. And there is a minimum waiting time of 6 months between the day a student receives the Driver Training Permit from our instructor and the day a teen can apply for a driver’s license. In Idaho, any licensed driver over 21 can supervise the teen for those 50 hours. It doesn’t have to be a licensed instructor. In most cases, parents can teach their teens just fine, and they will be able to pass the tests and get their driver’s license after 6 months. But there may be reasons you would like your teen to drive some or all of those 50 hours with our licensed instructor. For example, some parents are too busy to get all the hours done within 6 months, but don’t want their teens to have to wait to get their regular licenses. In other families, most of the driving is done with the whole family in the car, and some parents are worried about putting their other children at risk by having a student driver at the wheel. In some cases, parents prefer for their teens to have the benefit of more driving in a vehicle with instructor override pedals. If for any reason you would like your teen to drive any of those 50 hours with us, we are happy to offer further professional instruction at a rate of $75 per hour.
The 50 hours of supervised driving must be logged. Idaho does not require any particular format to be used. You can keep a paper log, use a computer spreadsheet, or use any one of several apps. We recommend the RoadReady app.
After the 6 months have passed, the teen has driven the required 50 hours, and those hours have been logged, the next step is to take the road test. In Idaho, the road test is given by a private contractor, not a government employee. These contractors are called Skills Test Examiners. Click here for a list of licensed Skills Test Examiners in North Idaho. The Class D License is the regular driver’s license. If your teen passes the road test, the examiner will give you a sealed envelope. Do not open this envelope.
The final step is to make an appointment with the county Driver’s License Office. Bring the sealed envelope and the teen’s learner’s permit to the appointment. Your teen will need to pass the written test and the vision test before receiving a driver’s license.
Stick Shift Training
Our instructor, Carle Mock, has more than 30 years of experience driving vehicles with manual transmissions, and he can help you learn, too. Crusader Driving School requires all students who want to learn to drive a stick shift to already have either a learner’s permit or regular driver’s license before starting their lessons in a vehicle with a manual transmission. Carle can teach you in either his own 2006 VW Jetta TDI or in your vehicle. If your family has a stick-shift vehicle, and you would like your teen to learn in it, Carle can drive to your house and begin and end the lesson there. Teens can sign up for Stick Shift Training immediately after they have passed our Regular Teen Driving Course. Our standard rate of $75 per hour will apply to all stick shift lessons, and both lesson time and instructor travel time will be billed, if you choose that option.
Students 17 & Up
If you are 17 or older, you can get an Idaho driver’s license by passing the road skills and written tests, and you will not be required to show that you have completed a driver’s training course. If you can pass those tests, you don’t need to get a training permit. But if you would like to have some lessons from Crusader Driving School before you take your driver’s license tests, you must have one of the two Idaho training permits first.
If you are between 17 and 17 1/2 years old, you can choose either one. You can enroll in our Regular Teen Driving Course in the same way as younger teens and apply for a Driver Training Permit, or you can apply for a Class D Instruction Permit.
All students who are 17 1/2 or older must have a Class D Instruction Permit before enrolling with Crusader Driving School. At your appointment with the county Driver’s License Office, you will be required to pass the written test before you receive a Class D Instruction Permit. We can arrange for you to go through the same 30-hour online course as younger teens before you take the written test if you would like, but most students study the Idaho Driver’s Handbook on their own.
Once you have a Class D Instruction Permit, you can legally drive with any licensed driver over 18 in the front seat next to you. It does not have to be a licensed driving instructor. But if you would like some practice with our instructor, we will be happy to give you fully customized driving lessons. We can work on any areas in which you would like some help. We can help you practice freeway, rural, mountain, or city driving. If you’d like to do some practice road skills tests before the real thing, we can help with that, too. Our standard rate of $75 per hour will apply.
Location:
Located in the office of Crusader Income Tax
920 N Spokane Street
Post Falls, ID 83854
208-298-9068
Hours:
SUNDAY: CLOSED
MONDAY: 9AM–5PM
TUESDAY: 9AM–5PM
WEDNESDAY: 9AM–5PM
THURSDAY: CLOSED
FRIDAY: 9AM–5PM
SATURDAY: BY APPOINTMENT ONLY
Holiday Closings:
New Year’s Day
(January 1)
Good Friday
(Friday before Easter)
Memorial Day
(Last Monday in May)
Independence Day
(July 4)
Assumption Day
(August 15)
All Saints Day
(November 1)
Day After Thanksgiving
(Fourth Friday in November)
Immaculate Conception Day
(December 8)
Christmas Day
(December 25)